On sheer and utter ignorance
by scratchmarred
Summary: Bellatrix confides in her halfdrunk cousin, with not the most optimistic of results. [SiriusBellatrix]


**Rating:PG**-13  
**Word count:** 666 (fear it!)

Brandy is gold thrice-woven and spun and then gracelessly spilt in a glass that hasn't known a good polish since the days of its making. He's had a fortune at his disposal, but never made a use of it, never bent the knee to _that_ and called it his master as he does with each love filled glance thrown idly over the content of his half-filled goblet. "Like love. If you don't make a waste of it in time, it'll take over your soul. And where's the fun in that? Take James, for example…"  
But she doesn't. James is only another glittering image crowning Sirius' pedestal, someone she will never understand, because they're so uniquely unlike that it's almost sickening. _Almost_. James is the sour, ash-like taste she chokes on whenever he mentions Hogwarts. James is his very own poison, feeding her to the flames of her own highborn mediocrity as she stands there, screaming her lack of understanding. And to think she hasn't even an inkling of what the boy looks like.  
"To James, then!" He toasts to Potter's fortune once, then to his lady mother, whose memory he also graces with a parting curse, as befits such a devoted son. She'd suggest that he toast too to the ghost of his sobriety, but even that has taken its leave him, and not to her displeasure. She fancies him more when he's horribly drunk, and therefore reasonably stupid, than when he's wide awake and flaunting his Gryffindor pride. Her cousin is not the only one who can handle a bottle with some semblance of style, but he's among the few whose company doesn't grow wearisome after a second and who actually develops a certain charm after a third.  
He's far less a barbarian when drunk, to be sure. Almost cynical, too, though life has treated him kindlier than he deserves. And his hands are in the distinct habit of wandering far closer, lingering just where and as long as it takes to reveal an interest otherwise hidden during the few occasions when they see eye to eye and when glasses are not taken out.  
And he doesn't half mind, really.  
"I love you."  
Where the words came from she rather can't tell; where they're going, she imagines, is their own private hell. A rhyme, there. Such a poor one, though. She has always considered herself tolerably well educated, with little shyness when it comes to things of worth, to the bright and shiny names of some author or the other. But she's never mastered poetry, and she loathes riddles.  
She doesn't know where they came from, nor will she play at guessing. And she is a Black, and a Black's word once given is never taken back.  
He laughs. He's wickedly beautiful when he does that, and she's equally proud as his mother surely is, because the object of her affections will always be a special sort of possession. Passion she might be inclined to; a certain intimacy as well. But affection is not something she can afford to consider, whereas ownership comes so easily. He laughs again. "You silly little whore, they never did break you of it, did they? Lying. That's all you do, that's all you know. You're lying."  
"Never." Why would she?  
"And again." Ah, so he knows the game.  
"Perhaps." The Slytherin smile now, yes, smile for the devil. "But I do love you."  
There's silence between them, silence so thick it's maddening; unexpectedly, James is only an overture, and the true belladonna is only now slipping down her throat. She's gulping it down greedily with each passing moment.

"To you, Bellatrix," he says all too suddenly, with a mock-polite nod and a sly little smile, taking his last sip.  
If she looks away now, she's lost. "I love you."  
He crushes the goblet in his hand, and when the shards of glass spike his flesh, the thrice-woven gold is no more precious than his blood. "You'll get over it."

-

**_Author's note part:_**_ Excuse me the OOCness and whatnot. I do promise to make it up once I'm done slaving for the webcomic…also, dear stop messing with my formatting? Please? For the love of all that is Cherry Coke?_


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